Page 49

Later I’d consider the implication of his words. For now, I needed my violin. It had been days if not weeks since I last touched it which meant I was going to sound like chicken scratch. Not to mention whatever damage had been done to my emotional regulation.

I was really going to practice. I really was. My violin was right there, in its case leaning against a bookshelf filled with my musical tomes. A little vase with a crystal rose was above it practically calling on me to rescue my violin lest an earthquake happen and it falls on top of the case.

Tuning was going to be my worst enemy, but it was right there. Just as I reached it, a quick knock sounded. For two heartbeats, I didn’t do anything and it clicked open.

In walked the blood slave who always accompanied the Emerald Lady. If it had been anyone else, I might have actually began the long and arduous process of tuning my violin after a period of neglect.

But the one who entered was a blood slave. Not just any random one blood slave. No, she was the one who always accompanied the Emerald Lady: the pretty one with long straight black hair and dark slanted eyes. The one who always adorned herself in jewels and makeup. The one with a freewoman as a lover. The one who was just so happy.

We were in the same position, but she was happy and I was not. Really my actions were just righting the wrongs of the universe, when I really think about it. No, think wasn’t the right word because there were no thoughts, only emotions which had no place outside of a performance. But my shade had been keeping me from my precious instrument for so long so really it was his fault. Yes, what I did was because of my shade, not me. I didn’t do anything wrong.

Instead of my violin, I picked up the crystal vase and threw it at the blood slave’s head. It shattered, crystal and porcelain shards shattering as she fell to her knees. Rivulets of blood flowed down her head, but her eyes met mine. Indifference and pity transforming into dislike.

Ah, it would seem that I have become the villain in her story.

And as expected she screamed. It was a high pitched, eardrum-piercing echo throughout whatever building we were now in. Like a scene in a play or a movie, a crowd rushed in.

That was when the crying started. How funny. It was all just so bloody hilarious. I was the one who was being forced to marry a creature who was clearly insane. I was the one who had to learn a language and customs of a world not my own. I was the one who had to stamp down everything and pretend madness was reason. Yet now I was the wicked one who harmed someone weaker than me.

So as people came to check on the blood slave’s wound and usher her away, I laughed. Not a small giggle either. This was the big belly-aching laugh that had me clutching my stomach and falling to my knees in an effort to contain it. Even as a part of me noticed the judgemental stares I could not stop.

So I laughed and I laughed and I laughed until I was on my back, my violin case just out of reach. If I reached out, my fingers would just graze the thick material binding the instrument within.

“Is your tantrum over?” I turned my head to the side to see the Emerald Lady standing as regal or ever.

I pulled back my hand, starting to hum a tune. “Tantrum?”

“What else am I supposed to call it when someone so rational suddenly acts out of character?” Her words were slow and even. Usually I appreciated it, but today it was patronizing.

My hair was in disarray, flying in a thousand and sixty different directions. If I was the typical me, they’d be in braids but there was nothing typical about this situation.

I stayed on my back, looking up at the perfectly decorated crystal roofing. “Tell me, what sort of person is that man—no, not a man—strigaix?”

She dismissed everyone from the room and then said, “I don’t understand what language you are speaking.”

The Emerald Lady’s voice had me pulling up into a sitting position, my legs crisscrossed. “The strigaix, is he good or bad?”

“Good and evil are the concerns of mortals,” she said, a hand on her hip. “To the Strigaix there is only order and disorder. A little madness is nothing so long as the mask of order is kept.”

This was the proverbial olive branch I should have taken. If I stood up and pretended everything was okay, all would be well, but there were no olive trees on this planet so I laid back down, closing my eyes as I spoke. “Is he order or disorder?”

“We will talk about this later. For now, get up.”

“Why?” My eyes were still closed and I even started humming a melody without a name.

“You have to apologize.”

The melody died and I sat up once more. “Why?”

“You hurt one of my things and I am your elder and matron.” She tossed around words without meaning as if I was supposed to know what they meant. “If you refuse, you will be punished.”

“What you do. I have nothing and no one.”

“We could break your fingers or cut off your tongue or even smash that instrument you treasure so much.”

“If no more music,” I stood up on shaky legs. “No more me and that problem, no?”

Facing her eye to eye, I thought she was really going to do something, maybe one of the things that she threatened. Then someone neither mortal nor strigaix entered. He moved to swiftly and languidly to be human, but his eyes were as black as shadow, his long straight ink-like hair pulled into a ponytail.